Ultrahuman raises $70M with Qualcomm backing to build smart rings that run their own software

The round and the chip switch

Ultrahuman, the Bengaluru-based startup known for its smart rings, has raised $70 million in a round that counts Qualcomm's venture arm among its backers, according to TechCrunch. The financing values the company at about $365 million, roughly three times the $120 million valuation it carried in 2023, a person familiar with the matter told the publication.

The round consists of $65 million in primary equity and $5 million in debt, founder and CEO Mohit Kumar said in an interview with TechCrunch. Qualcomm Ventures is joined by U.S. diagnostics firm Labcorp, Alpha Wave, Blume Ventures, Nexus Venture Partners and Alteria Capital.

The Qualcomm relationship goes beyond capital. Ultrahuman is developing a new ring built on Qualcomm silicon, replacing the Nordic Semiconductor chips in its current devices. Kumar said the added processing power should let more software and algorithms execute on the ring itself, reducing its dependence on a phone or the cloud.

From tracker to computer

Kumar's argument is that every ring on the market today is essentially a sensor package that measures heart rate, movement and sleep, while Ultrahuman wants a device that behaves like a computer and runs programs locally. That opens the door to developers writing their own applications for the ring, and to the device serving as a pointer or mouse, a game controller, a car key or an interface for AI.

The form factor is central to the idea. Because a ring sits on a finger, it can act as a precise input device while also carrying physiological context such as heart rate, temperature and motion. Kumar pointed to games that react not only to a player's gestures but also to biometric signals as one example of what becomes possible.

Ultrahuman is not waiting for the Qualcomm-powered hardware to test the concept. Kumar told TechCrunch that features including controller functions, interaction with AI applications and support for third-party developers will reach the existing Ring Air and Ring Pro through a software update by the end of September.

Quinn Li, global head of Qualcomm Ventures, described the investment as backing a new generation of personal, ambient and always-on AI devices.

A growing core business

The existing business is expanding while the company widens its ambitions. Kumar said Ultrahuman is at an annual revenue run rate of $140 million, up about 45 percent from a year earlier, and expects that figure to reach $200 million by January 2027. It has sold around 800,000 rings to date, up from roughly 700,000 in February, and about 12 percent of users pay for PowerPlugs, its subscription software tier.

Founded in 2019 by Kumar and Vatsal Singhal, Ultrahuman began with continuous glucose monitors before moving into rings, which became its mainstay, and has since added blood testing and environmental sensing.

The United States remains its largest market, but a patent dispute with rival Oura kept the Ring Air off U.S. shelves for much of the past year. Ultrahuman returned this year with the redesigned Ring Pro, and Kumar said demand currently runs at 18 to 20 times available supply. He expects to recover previous U.S. sales volumes as soon as next quarter and to triple them over the following four quarters. The U.S. accounts for about 45 percent of revenue this quarter, while India contributes about 11 percent.

Some of the new capital will fund deeper expansion in markets such as India and the UAE, where physical stores have helped drive sales, along with clinical research and product development. That spending means Ultrahuman may not be profitable this year, according to Kumar.

Unlike Oura, which TechCrunch notes is reportedly preparing for a September IPO, Ultrahuman is in no rush to list. Kumar wants roughly eight quarters of profitability on the books first and sees 2028 as the earliest window for going public.

The Labcorp connection

Ultrahuman is also exploring a closer collaboration with Labcorp, examining whether blood-flow signals captured by the ring, paired with blood-test data, could help identify health risks in areas such as cardiovascular health, fertility and aging. Kumar said product integrations could follow, with more announcements expected soon.

Why it matters

Most wearables today remain accessories that collect data and hand it off to a phone. Ultrahuman's bet, now underwritten by Qualcomm, is that a ring can become a general-purpose computing and interaction device, combining precise finger-level input with continuous physiological context. If third-party software and on-device AI take hold on a ring, it stops being a tracker and becomes a platform in its own right, with a developer ecosystem to match. For Qualcomm, it is a test of whether meaningful AI compute can shrink into one of the smallest form factors in consumer hardware, and for the smart ring market it signals a shift from passive sensing toward devices that act, respond and run code on your hand.